Tag Archives: GranuFlo

Undergoing any sort of medical treatment can be frightening and overwhelming. This is particularly true when person is experiencing something as potentially harmful and threatening as kidney failure. Fortunately, for anyone who has kidney failure or damage, there are a number of treatment options available. A kidney transplant is a less common choice as it is only needed for those with severe kidney damage or failure and can be both difficult and expensive to get. As such, many people with more serious kidney failure, disease, or damage will get dialysis in order to make sure their wellbeing and health is maintained as best as possible.

There are five different types of dialysis, three of which are primarily used. Through each of these forms, a person artificially has their blood filtered of harmful toxins, waste products, and excess products that build-up in their blood, which is the work that the kidney would ordinarily do. Of these three most common forms of dialysis, hemodialysis is the most commonly used treatment for patients with kidney failure. As such, many patients with kidney failure have dialysates, products that help filter the blood, put into their blood system. While many of these products are safe, recently a certain dialysate – GranuFlo – has found to be just the opposite.

Sadly, GranuFlo, which is designed to neutralize the harmful acids that build-up in a person’s body when their kidneys are not functioning properly by converting into bicarbonates, causes an excessive amount of bicarbonates to build-up in a person’s blood system. As a result of this excessive amount of bicarbonate, a person could find themselves facing a number of very serious health problems, including:

Heart arrhythmias

Strokes

Cardiac arrests

Low blood pressure

Metabolic alkalosis

Additionally, the patient’s family may be left seriously grieving if their loved one suddenly dies as a result of using GranuFlo.

Because of the very dangerous health problems that GranuFlo can cause, not to mention the risk of death, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration issued a Class 1 recall of the product in March of 2013. It was also discovered that Fresenius Medical Care, the manufacturer of GranuFlo, previously knew about the dangers GranuFlo presented when it was found that a memo was released warning of the problems this product could cause, but many members of the general public and medical profession were not made equally aware of these hazards. As a result, many victims and/or their families are taking legal action against the company and filing lawsuits to pursue justice and compensation for their losses and suffering.